Peabloggy

Since I’m knee deep in statistics reading at the moment, I thought I would take a break to discuss my thoughts on the second Ed.D. summer class for the higher education folks. As we begin our second year, we’re finally getting into more classes focused on our respective areas, and I couldn’t be happier. I’ve enjoyed learning more about K-12 education over the past year, but since my wife and I don’t have a child to be left behind, I’m ready to learn how to manage colleges and universities (where the kids are still a bit whiny, but on the whole, much lower maintenance). That’s where Caboni comes in.

We’re still about two weeks away from our class with Dr. Caboni, but I’ve already heard marvelous things about the class and the man behind the bow-tie. We’ll apparently be reading The Chronicle quite a bit (which is rock awesome), and if my friend in the 2009 cohort is correct, the class is a bit of an epiphany for college administrators. My wife and I are excited about the class, even if it is only to get some break from stats. So if Dr. Caboni reads this, I want him to know that we’re all ready…and we also expect to see the seersucker come out at least once over the summer.

- Landon C. Clark

The thought of taking statistics, or quantitative methods, had frightened me for as long as I knew how write my numbers on those paper rolls, where you keep taping new sheets for every 100 or so, in elementary school. I had already discovered that the liberal arts were more my area, and I was content to work within my strengths. I managed to get my master’s degree without statistics, so I thought perhaps I was in the clear. Then, there it was, on my Ed. D. academic plan (dun, dun, dun): quantitative methods! Oh…no.

Oh, yes, and in fact, this weekend is my cohort’s second session of statistics. Despite moments of pure frustration working on a problem set this past weekend, I have to admit I feel as though I am learning. Now, that learning curve is steep, and sometimes I feel like I may be rounding wide corners that could toss me off the track altogether, yes. However, I will survive, and with greater skills and more knowledge than just a few weeks ago. So, perhaps, it isn’t as bad as I thought…right? (Refer to my blog earlier this year on math in a dreamworld.)

-Teresa Bagamery Clark

Having just finished my last paper for the Spring semester, I thought I would reflect on my first year as a doctoral student. Even though the readings and papers were seemingly endless, the Ed.D. program has really flown by over the past year. I guess it’s difficult to tell time when there is no real break in the action.

The program at Peabody is really more manageable and appealing than what I had expected. Even going into this past semester (which is becoming legendary as the most difficult of the entire program), I wasn’t that stressed out. Sure it was hard, but that’s what doctoral programs are supposed to like, right? But no matter how difficult the classes, papers, and projects have been, I am actually learning, and more importantly, I am learning how to integrate the theories and applications in my current professional position. Developing professionals is what an Ed.D. is all about, and I doubt any program in the country does as well at this as Peabody.

- Landon C. Clark

Just one year ago at this time, I began my first reading assignments for Dr. Michael McLendon’s leadership course. This weekend, my cohort and I officially start our second year at Peabody. No longer are we first-year Ed. D. students but now second-year. It really makes a psychological difference; we are one-third of the way through our doctoral studies. We are not new to the program anymore. A whole other group of nervous, excited, and curious individuals will begin their Ed. D. studies this weekend. My cohort will be there for them, first of all this Saturday delivering breakfast treats and offering our greetings, but we hope the interaction does not end this weekend. The arrangement of Peabody’s Ed. D. provides the fortunate opportunity of networking and building friendships with classmates, and we hope to foster those sorts of relationships with the new cohort. After all,  we know what is it like to begin this wild and glorious journey that is a doctoral program.

-Teresa Bagamery Clark

As part of Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to the United States last week, he addressed educators representing the nation’s 200 Catholic colleges and universities at the Catholic University of America. As my cohort has learned in Social Context of Education, religion, like politics, is a sensitive discussion topic in a democracy. However, like the Pope, we should engage in dialogues with our neighbors about subjects that shape us as citizens (see Jean Bethke’s Elshtain’s Democracy on Trial).

Pope Benedict XVI exhorted the crowd at Catholic University with the concept that “faith is compatible with reason.” This is a wise perspective for all institutions of Christian higher education. Teaching biblical beliefs should not water down the content and expertise of education; if integrated correctly, it should improve upon all areas of a university and the college experience as a whole.

-Teresa Bagamery Clark

One year ago this week, college students around the country were united in prayer and support for fellow students suffering from shocking acts of violence. As when a brother is hurt or a sister slain, university students cried out as a family against the attack at Virginia Tech. Groups appeared online with courageous words of unity and strength among the collective body of higher education, students standing together with their peers. No longer rivals, colleges throughout the nation rose up to encourage a suffering campus.

University staff all over shuddered at the thought, “could it happen here?” As new emergency plans, evacuation routes, and alert systems have emerged and tightened over the past year, let us hope that the response of teams of campus professionals can prevent another painful memory. Let us hope that with wisdom we may foresee danger, and that the good within us will overcome disaster. We remember.

-Teresa Bagamery Clark

When I started college in 1999, I moved into the same residence hall where my father once resided and served as an RA. And when I say the same, I literally mean the same furniture, same furnishings, and everything else. I didn’t really care that that hall had not changed in over 25 years…I was just happy to be out on my own. But then again, I am probably not like a lot of our students today.

I currently work as a Residence Director in a hall that is 95 years old, and it happens to be the most popular option for first-year male students at my institution. My wife and I might tire of the paper-thin walls and the lack of some amenities, but my residents love it for one simple fact: it’s a community. Community should be the big issue in housing, not catering to the individual. And it doesn’t cost $270 million to build a community that students don’t want to leave.

-Landon C. Clark

Some may argue that 18-year-old college freshmen are “adults.” Maybe some are, and some are not. Perhaps all really are true adults in some sense, and the definition of an “adult” student becomes thus muddied. However, students looking to complete their bachelor’s degree or start what they never had the opportunity to begin before, now at ages over 25 know they are adults. Moms and dads in their early twenties trying to work full-time who sacrifice what little social life they have to complete their dream–or at least get the diploma–know they are adults.

I currently work with an adult degree program, so I am pleased to get a confirmation from this article that adult learning, college for non-traditional students, is hot. Credit for life experience and free classes for those who take the plunge back into school make it easier for students to finish their degrees. The author also cites the importance of educating the work force.

-Teresa Bagamery Clark

I have always thought of myself as a thinker. Perhaps one of the best benefits of the Ed. D. program is thinking in new ways with new knowledge about old questions and current issues. My husband, who is in my cohort, and I often spend portions of our evenings discussing the readings due for the upcoming class meeting or what our classmates said last weekend and wrestling with the big-picture ideas from our courses. Maybe this means we are too cerebral, or old before our time, or just boring. In any case, we are not alone.

Thinkers are emerging from within the country’s universities and declaring philosophy as their major. The question may arise, as one parent is quoted in the article as asking, “What are you going to do with that?” However, parents could ask this about many majors other than philosophy (I have a bachelor’s in writing; believe me, I get it), and the question has some merit. I am not discrediting the importance of asking that question; after all, jobs, money, food, and stuff is important. Though, in some sense, isn’t it just a bit wonderful that young people are taking time out before entering the corporate life to ponder the meaning of it all?

-Teresa Bagamery Clark

Academic tenure is a beast. The topic has been discussed for years and years throughout the academe, and now with new technologies, has gone the way of the blogger. Tenure is highly sought after by those that don’t have it and lamented by some that do. It’s appeal is understandable, but is it worth the trouble and endless amounts of antacids that it sometimes requires?

I am curious to see the effect of tenure on the Millennial generation. As the super educated and highly mobile generation begins working into the faculty ranks, I wonder where they will place priority. Will the Millennials be content with a paycheck for life, or, will they go the route of exorbitant short-term contracts and the freedom to move where they choose? If my students are any indication, they might go with the latter. Students today don’t like to be locked into anything (cell phone contracts, meal plans, on-campus housing, majors, etc.) so I don’t know how they would feel being locked into something like tenure, even if a paycheck is involved.

- Landon C. Clark